Posted by Patrick Henry on July 13, 1998 at 18:33:43:
In Reply to: Re: Motion to dismiss Traffic Ticket on US Constitutional grounds posted by Dot on July 13, 1998 at 10:23:15:
Special appearances have been the historic vehicle for challenging a court's jurisdiction. If you will dig back through old court records, you may find some pleadings which utilize the special appearance.
There is a lot of BS floating around about asking the court to do anything automatically "granting" the court jurisdiction. My opinion, for what is is worth, is that it is just that -- BS.
If you make a special appearance in order to challenge the jurisdiction of the court over your person, what are you going to do, wave your sword or Uzzi at the court? You are there, in the capacity of a
moving party, for the specific purpose of convincing the court that it has NO PERSONAL JURISDICTION to proceed on the merits of the case.
Since today's courts are "moved" to do one thing or the other via motions, you are stuck with it. It is rare that a court will acknowledge some archaic form of pleading that does not conform with the current
rules of court.